


Splitting Beneath You

by metatxt



Category: Scandal (TV)
Genre: BDSM, Breathplay, Choking, Crying, Doppelcest, Doppelganger, F/F, Fingerfucking, I think I held my breath a lot when I wrote this, Kink Negotiation, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Prison Sex, Smut, Trust Issues, Wall Sex, Water metaphors, hallucinations or hazy metaphysical realities, omgs did I make the deadline, sex as character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-05
Updated: 2014-05-05
Packaged: 2018-01-22 00:03:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1568708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/metatxt/pseuds/metatxt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Beta'd by <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/projectcyborg">projectcyborg</a>. This scene is set in 2012. Prison. Early S2.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Splitting Beneath You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Moontyger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moontyger/gifts).



> Beta'd by [projectcyborg](http://archiveofourown.org/users/projectcyborg). This scene is set in 2012. Prison. Early S2.

She didn’t kill Jesse. But neither did she. Her mirror, her double, her foil, her ghost. Some days Lindsay goes to trial. Other days Quinn. But in the cell, she’s never alone. In the cell, Quinn flexes her fists on the cell door bars, letting her knuckles turn red then white then red. Lindsay crouches in the corner, ass to heels, eyes closed, biting at her hangnails.  
  
If Lindsay weren’t so scared, she would resent Quinn being there, so smug and above it all. Quinn doesn’t seem to feel the walls or the threat of death looming over her. She seems bored. But Lindsay is scared, so she watches Quinn like a lifeline she just can’t trust.  
  
When Lindsay can’t stand it anymore, she speaks up. “Why are you even here? You don’t even like me.”  
  
“I am you.”  
  
Lindsay rolls her eyes. “You want to be in prison.”  
  
“Who says I’m the one here voluntarily.” Quinn’s voice runs flat as she turns away, dangling her arms between the bars of the cell door. “Maybe it’s you. Maybe Lindsay died and you’re just haunting me.”  
  
Lindsay’s eyes widen in affront, her hands shake. “How can you even joke about death right now?”  
  
“Or maybe it’s true. You are the one really here, on trial for your life. Maybe you summoned me. Maybe you find my presence comforting.”  
  
Lindsay’s cheeks flush and her face burns hot. “Comfort is the last thing I’d seek from you. You’re so hard.”  
  
Quinn doesn’t even bother to turn around. “But you like hard. You think you shouldn’t, so you tell yourself you don’t, but you really, really do.” It seems so obvious, so plain to her now, confronted with Lindsay, confronted with herself.  “You’ll learn it soon enough. You think the world is a safe place, but it isn’t. You think the world is a fair place, but you’re wrong. You are on trial for terrorism. And you may be innocent of blowing up eight people, but the presumption of innocence, the affordance of innocence earned by years of being a good girl — a good white girl — cannot protect you from a perfect set-up and the naiveté of 12 of your peers.”  
  
Lindsay pauses and purses her lips, chin quivering, eyes filling with tears. “You are me, aren’t you?” Her eyes dart between the spartan features of the cell. The smooth cement walls. The metal bunk. The metal toilet. And the iron bars. Through Lindsay’s blurry tears, the bars of the door seem to waiver and move, pressing in on Quinn, until it’s no longer clear which side of the door Quinn is on. Lindsay stands to move closer, each wobbly step becoming slightly more sure. “I’m going to be convicted and I’m going to turn into… you!”  
  
This time it’s Quinn’s turn to roll her eyes.  
  
And although Lindsay bites her lip to try and prevent it, big, heavy tears spill out down her face. Her mouth twists down, agape while she sobs and gasps for air.  
  
Quinn’s face softens and she crosses the cell towards her, but Lindsay instinctively backs up against the wall. With two strides Quinn is pressed warmly against her now, hand squeezing her arm, locking eyes. “You are not going to rot in prison.” Quinn presses her palm against Lindsay’s face and swipes her thumb across her tear-stained cheek. Lindsay’s breathing slows and Quinn studies her face. (Really? this is all it takes?)  
  
Incredulous, Quinn hushes,“I don’t have the answers, sweetie, but if you let me, I will comfort you.”  
  
Lindsay closes her eyes. No answers and no one to save her. No solid ground to hold her. Nothing but this cell and Quinn. Soft and firm, Quinn’s fingertips press into the flesh of Lindsay’s cheek, and she pushes her head back against the wall. “Stay.”  
  
Quinn’s hand slides down to clamp around the side of Lindsay’s throat, steady and powerful and warm, as Quinn leans in and flutters light kisses along Lindsay’s face. And though Lindsay’s head is spinning, her sobs still jutting to the surface in jagged gasps, each kiss centers her focus, every touch letting that part of her feel whole and safe and real again. Quinn drags her teeth along Lindsay’s jaw and then she’s at her earlobe, teasing with her tongue in long, languid flicks. Quinn’s breath burns hot along her neck. In another time or place, Lindsay might squirm away from such focused attention, but Quinn’s hand on her throat makes her feel secure and anchored, so she shifts her weight and leans into Quinn instead.  
  
With Lindsay’s earlobe trapped between Quinn’s teeth, Quinn slides her other hand along the side of Lindsay’s hip, then across, pressing her palm against Lindsay’s sex. As Quinn’s fingers trace the outline of Lindsay’s labia, Lindsay bites her lip and holds her breath. The secure feeling, that vice of Quinn’s hand at Lindsay’s throat, tightens slightly. Quinn draws her teasing hand up and holds Lindsay’s chin between her thumb and forefinger.  
  
Quinn instructs, “open your eyes and tell me—” Quinn’s grip on Lindsay’s throat flexes tighter and Lindsay can’t breathe, can’t say anything, but her eyes open anyway “—is this what you need?” Quinn releases her grip and Lindsay gasps in relief, bending slightly into the absence of Quinn’s hand.  
  
Quinn dips her head to meet Lindsay’s eyes, “steady now, just slow deep breaths.” Lindsay nods quickly. “Yes, yes this.”  
  
As Quinn tilts Lindsay’s head back against the wall, she presses her grip against Lindsay’s throat again. Her thumb rests below Lindsay’s jugular. Quinn kicks Lindsay’s stance slightly wider and digs her knee against Lindsay’s cunt, pinning her hips. Quinn’s hand on Lindsay’s throat flexes and releases, flexes and releases, building a rhythm of increasingly longer and slower gaps. As Lindsay lets herself go, lets Quinn give and take as she wants, she locks her gaze on Quinn’s face. Her eyes seem darker now, more penetrating, though they no longer return her gaze; instead, Quinn seems fixated on Lindsay’s mouth.  
  
Quinn’s knuckles grazes across Lindsay’s nipple. She pauses to pinch the tip between her forefinger and thumb, and then twists. Pain shoots into Lindsay’s chest. She needs to suck in all the air at once, and hold her breath, but nothing comes. Quinn’s grip on her throat relaxes and Lindsay gasps. It reminds her of learning to swim – bobbing to the surface, close to panic, and then the blissful rush of oxygen. And then Quinn denies her, and Lindsay submerges again, closing her eyes. She turns inward and let’s herself relax into the downward drift.  
  
Quinn watches as Lindsay melts into her hands. She likes to feel her clench around the absence of breath and then collapse, heavy, as she gasps with each release. Quinn thinks their resemblance seems stronger now, somehow. In her stillness, Lindsay seems less cornered, less tightly wound. Quinn eases the pressure of her knee to make room for her hand to snake into the opening of Lindsay’s jumpsuit. She slides her fingers through the damp thatch of hair and pins her spread.  
  
Quinn’s middle finger teases into the pool of wetness around Lindsay’s opening. “Is this what you needed?” Quinn taunts. Lindsay lolls her head and nods. With that, Quinn curls two fingers inside and relaxes the hand trapping Lindsay’s throat. Her cunt seems to open along with her panting mouth, drawing Quinn’s hand in deeper. Quinn’s fingers flutter softly inside, and then she seizes Lindsay’s breath again and they turn hard, pressing into her G-spot. Quinn drags her fingertips along the front of Lindsay’s cunt, her other hand tightening with each thrust, Lindsay’s walls tightening around her. Lindsay’s grip on Quinn’s hand steadily seizing tighter.  
  
Quinn slides her thumb along the shaft of Lindsay’s clit, and it’s almost too much for Lindsay to bear. Quinn holds firm but she lets Lindsay take one long drag of air. Lindsay tries to hold onto it, tries to keep it in, but Quinn won’t start up again until she finally has to exhale. She adds a third finger, and then she’s fucking Lindsay fast and hard. Lindsay’s wetness pools in her palm as she clenches around Quinn’s fingers. Another gasping breath. Quinn brushes her thumb across Lindsay’s clit again, and a jolt seems to surge from that thumb to the ends of Lindsay’s toes. It takes Quinn’s full weight against Lindsay’s hip to keep her upright as she trembles against Quinn’s  tight circles inside, choking and heaving for air that isn’t there.  
  
Quinn’s body goes limp along with Lindsay’s and they collapse, Lindsay heavy in Quinn’s arms, dewy forehead pressed into Quinn’s neck. They’re a tangle of limbs on the cold cement floor, sweaty and spent. Each full breath burns through Lindsay’s chest. She wonders how a breath could feel so sharp, but she lets herself float on the surface.  
  
Quinn breaks the silence. “It’s not so complicated — why I’m here. Someday you’ll understand your need to stare into the face of danger and survive.”

**Author's Note:**

> Note to [Moontyger](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Moontyger): Thank you for your detailed and reassuring prompt letter! I totally ran with that license for kink and pwp and I hope you feel I exercised that option responsibly. I really enjoyed trying to tackle the question of "when (and how) does Lindsay become Quinn?" Considering the plotty canon alone, this character continuity vacuum feels somewhat inexplicable for me as well. I attempted to find some common ground in Lindsay/Quinn's self-negation, not to mention the chasm between her desires and her self-image. Ultimately this meant dopplegangers, and where there are dopplegangers, there must be dopplecest. I hope you enjoy the fic.


End file.
